4/24/2008 @ 6:00PM

China's Education Flaws

I had the good fortune to be invited to teach a graduate course at Beijing University this spring semester. While the students were predictably smart, I gained other insights that were less predictable, chief among them being how imperfect and inflexible the educational system is in China.

Most students in China spend their whole lives trying to get into the top schools since high Communist Party officials get handpicked mainly from the most elite students in those schools.

They get weeded out through a series of nationwide standardized tests that start as early as grade school. But the pressure only begins there.

It’s quite typical for high school students to start their school day at 7:30 a.m. and end it at 11 p.m. Often, they need to pick a track or a major in which to specialize before they even enter college and frequently choose an area where they think they will have the greatest potential to enter a top school, even if it is not what they enjoy. A student may pick accounting because he knows he has a good shot at getting into Beijing University or Tsinghua University with that major, but he really has a love for chemistry and may even be good at it.

Sadly, even after they manage to enter the top school, they do not change majors and often end up working in the field that they studied rather than taking the chance to try what they truly want to do, mostly due to pressure from parents. So by gaming the system to get into a brand-name school, students systematically deny themselves (and China) the opportunity to reach their highest potential.

To enter a top M.B.A. program, for instance, schools select students with the highest test scores. But applicants with the highest test scores often do not equate to the best management talent. Grade school teachers may have more time to study for these standardized tests, while investment bankers, who have to work around the clock, have little time for test preparation. As a result, the teachers will beat out the investment bankers for a slot in the M.B.A. programs, but companies who recruit from these schools will subsequently discover that these graduates do not have the personal qualities necessary to ascend the managerial ladder in business.

I heard on many occasions that Western companies such as investment banks were complaining that they couldn’t find enough qualified people to hire, while at the same time, many Chinese graduates couldn’t find jobs. As of September 2007, up to a third of Chinese university graduates were unemployed.

Reports in the U.S. suggest that large numbers of engineers graduate from Chinese universities compared with the numbers that American universities turn out. These figures are often cited as evidence that the United States is losing its lead in science and technology. There is a fundamental fallacy in this argument–the quality of education simply is not comparable. A professor at Beijing University actually told me that the average Chinese engineering graduate may know no more than an auto mechanic.

Also, don’t be fooled by the sudden increase in patents being filed. The increase in numbers again does not necessarily equate to substantive advances. It’s possible to file a patent on a paper clip whose shape has simply been altered. Even though the PRC would love to boost its educational standards, the truth is that great schools and serious, ground-breaking research cannot be created overnight.

This is not to say that valuable research isn’t being conducted. One Beida (short for Beijing Daxue or Beijing University) professor shared with me her research in rising estrogen levels in fish as a reason for the shrinking fish population. She explained that male fish are becoming females due to the elevated estrogen levels caused by toxins in the environment. However, instead of focusing on conducting more research, many Chinese professors manage to have money-making ventures on the side. Even this environmental professor had considered a proposal by a venture capital firm to commercialize her studies.

Finally, while most Chinese are literate since the schools provide a basic classical education, the overall population does not have a wide variety of skills. For instance, classes for graphic arts or art conservation or any number of courses that students can take here in the U.S. are just not available in China. As a result of this narrow knowledge, most Western companies looking to hire skilled Chinese workers will find that they must invest a lot in training for even the most rudimentary tasks.

Certainly it is easy to criticize a system that is still in its infancy in the process of modernization–at least from the developed world’s perspective. I don’t discredit all their achievements and have no doubt that China will improve its educational processes and standards over time, but I do think it is premature to worry about its competitive advantage over the U.S. It still has a very long way to go.

Ann Lee is a visiting professor at Beijing University and an adjunct finance professor at Pace University. Before that, she was a partner at multibillion-dollar hedge fund firms. She was educated at the University of California-Berkeley, Princeton and Harvard.